Our People: Marion and Hugh Townend

MEDICALLY MUSICAL: Marion and Hugh Townend. PHOTO/BEN FRASER

NORMALLY this column is all about introducing fellow residents. Today the tables are turned as we farewell two who've lived among us for, well, yonks, and are already well known to many.

They're Marion and Hugh Townend and there's a good chance Hugh delivered a number of readers.

It's equally likely he'll be remembered as the Rotorua Hospital doctor kidnapped at knifepoint ... we'll get to that.

As the Townends' stories run in tandem we'll start with Marion. Locals by the score owe her their love of music.

For years she was at the forefront of the Rotorua Music School, her mantra "demystifying music by making it accessible to everyone", and if she hasn't taught you, the likelihood is you've heard her play in the Lakes District String Ensemble, the Opus Orchestra or a host of other musical groupings. The viola's her favoured instrument and it was the viola that brought the couple together.

In 1971, each was chosen to play it in the National Youth Orchestra and their first unofficial date was on board the bonerattling Wellington to Auckland overnight express.

By then Hugh was entrenched in medical school - not that doctoring had been his first career choice. "My parents were doctors and I always said I wouldn't be one because they never see their children."

With the aim of joining Foreign Affairs, he was working towards a BA in history and languages when he considered he'd become "too narrow. I did a zoology paper, my first science subject since failing School Cert chemistry, and loved it," - hence the switch to medicine.

Like Marion, music is his passion, he played in the Auckland Symphonia and the Dunedin Civic Orchestra "to pay the [student] fees".

Marion's working life began as a librarian but at 23 she shelved books to play in Melbourne's Elizabethan Theatre Trust's orchestra, accompanying Australia's opera and ballet companies. She becomes delightfully giggly, telling us that by then Hugh had already "pressed his suit".

"He issued this edict; 'if you don't come home and marry me that's it'." She obeyed; they married in Dunedin the day after his graduation.

His first house surgeon posting was Rotorua and Marion's recollection is vivid. "Our home was a prefab on hospital hill; when the furnace started it wobbled one way, an earthquake sent it the other. I learned to cook there with a Penguin cordon bleu cookbook in my hand."

Hugh was drawn to obstetrics and gynaecology, a sound choice, and his next job was running a tiny Murchison maternity hospital for the Health Department as "payback" for the fees it contributed towards his medical degree.

Locuming in Britain followed. "I put music on hold, Marion went to all the concerts."

When the time came to return there was no contest, Rotorua was the only place they hankered to live. Hugh joined the Old Taupo Rd practice of Drs Joe Chambers and Mark Irwin (Our People, November 14, 2014), and delivering babies went with the territory.

Their own territory was a barren 4ha-plus property on Oturoa Rd, close enough for a quick dash to the delivery suite; or, as Hugh puts it, "no woman was left with her legs crossed". Marion tutored music.

Hugh describes his GP days as 'soap opera-esque'.

"Our typist was strangled by her husband who tried to bury her in Whaka Forest but the ground was too hard so he drove to the police station and gave himself up.

"There was an arson by a disturbed patient, then one day I asked a woman from the circus to lie down for an examination ... when I turned around she was stark naked apart from her stilettos, making her even more naked - fate saved me, the house next door was on fire, I jumped out the window."

While Marion continued her high-profile involvement in Rotorua's musical community, Hugh returned to Britain for a course in venereology. "HIV was starting to be a concern."

Hugh returned to found the hospital's STD clinic. "Demand outstripped capacity, we expanded into the whole Bay of Plenty."

When the days of user pays spelled the clinic's demise, Hugh was offered an Emergency Department job. "I went from sex to violence."

By then violence had confronted him head on - here comes that kidnapping story. He was in his last days at the clinic when a man he'd never clapped eyes on held him hostage.

"He said 'I've got to do this' and produced a knife." For 80 tense minutes Hugh was held captive until he was able to knock the knife between his desk and the wall.

"I opened the door, the Armed Offenders Squad stormed in, I fell into an orderly's arms and burst into tears."

Drama became second nature to Hugh in the often-volatile ED unit. Unsurprisingly his CV reads "able to work under stress".

He spearheaded "the too successful for its own good" Hospital in the Home scheme - "canned because the hospital board wanted the numbers to build a new hospital".

The Townends moved to Wellington, Hugh working at Victoria University's student health clinic, Marion in the Alexander Turnbull Library's manuscript department.

Last year they returned to Oturoa Rd but the pull of family has drawn them to Martinborough.

"Naturally we'll miss Rotorua: friends, its bicultural character and endlessly fascinating physical and social history - but we've already got a string quartet lined up."

HUGH & MARION TOWNEND
Born: Hugh - Bournemouth, Britain, 1944. Marion - Christchurch, 1946.
Education: Hugh - St Joseph's Convent, Takapuna; St Patrick's Silverstream, Auckland & Otago Universities. Marion - Frankton Primary, Wellington Girls' College, NZ Library Association, Massey University (obtained MA in 50s).
Family: Four sons, two grandsons, five granddaughters.
Interests: Hugh - Music, bridge "I took it up at 60 to ward off Alzheimer's", gardening, being out in the bush. Marion - Music, New Zealand history, plants and birds, cooking.
Personal philosophies: Hugh - "You need someone to love so life has purpose." Marion - "The best things in life aren't things."